hey ted!, page-25

Petroleum projects have a technical cycle which to the outside world (market) seems glacial. It is a lot quicker onshore but the sequence is the same.

A Simplified onshore 'idea-to-producing field' cycle

1. find a block/basin that has potential. Obtain it at a reasonable price - 3 months to 2 years.
2. augment the initial geological/geophysical work. usually this means recording 1 possibly 2 rounds of seismic. 1 year (the current state of CVN's new permits) - one reason companies like to farm into areas with existing 3D seismic but cost of entry is high and prospectivity may be lower than a less developed block
3. drill wildcats and assess economic value of discoveries (if wells were discouraging the project may be terminated). 1 year
4. record 3D if not already done - drill appraisal locations to help quantify the size and nature of the discovery. 1 year
5. fabricate top side production facities and transport along with infill drill the field to an optimum spacing. likely ongoing from near the start but another year to optimize.
6. monitor the field during production and fine tune wells and production method.

The reason CVN looked good (and had lots of news) was that the new management reincarnated the existing unloved fields at step 4. Since they recompleted some existing wells they really had step 3 and 4 and even a little of step 5 in the same year. Reserves and production rates climbed and the stock went from zero to hero.
For a small company with focused assets, it is not always possible to have your acreage in the frothy good news cycle all the time. But if the technical excellence that recognized the original fields has the same success with the new permits, one would expect new discoveries and the positive effect they can have. And of course CVN has the advantage over many companies of having producing assets in step 6 that can fund growth.